ROYERSFORD — Following nearly four hours of interviews Thursday, the Spring-Ford School Board effectively chose the person who will be filling the seat vacated by longtime board member David Shafer.

The board chose to put Will Cromley on the agenda to be voted on for appointment to its Monday workshop meeting.

Cromley is a retired educator who served for 38 years in the Spring-Ford Area School District in capacities ranging from teaching sixth grade to librarian and media department chairman. He was chosen from a field of eight candidates to be put on Monday’s agenda.

A fixture at many board and committee meetings already, Cromley said he had a hand in shaping many of the media labs throughout the district during his time in the media department.

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Agreeing with the direction of the school board regarding curriculum, Cromley said an emphasis should be placed on creating a “global” curriculum for Spring-Ford students’ high school years. Such a curriculum would be aimed at competing with students across the world.

“That would be an attractive kind of environment,” he said.

He also said it would be “nice” for all high school students to get some vocational experience in their 11th and 12th grade years.

Cromley said he is a “big proponent” of allowing students to graduate early in December “to move on to an undergraduate school.”

He said he drew on the experience he had with his two sons, who graduated from the district in 2001 and 2009.

“After (my sons) were accepted to undergraduate colleges in October, they checked out on me,” Cromley said.

He said early graduation would be for those “unproductive in (the district) environment” after their acceptance to post-secondary programs.

“That’s a personal response with an experience I had twice in my life that I struggled with,” he said.

Cromley said whether or not he was appointed to the council’s open seat, he would run for school board in 2013 after the term expired.

Once all eight interviews for the Region I seat were completed well after 10 p.m. at Thursday’s special meeting, the board members went around the table and named the candidates they might like to bring back at Monday’s workshop for more interviews.

Cromley ended up being the candidate on all eight board members’ shortlists, so it was decided that he would be added to the agenda and no other candidates would be brought back.

“The process itself, as a sitting board, we could decide on any process,” said Tom DiBello, board president. “To fill that seat, we’re not required to do interviews.” However, the board chose to interview all the candidates that expressed written interest in filling the seat.

“We are an open board,” DiBello said. “Ultimately, it’s still a board decision.”

DiBello, along with others on the board, expressed pleasure at how the process went and emphasized the diversity and different perspectives brought forward by the eight candidates.

The second candidate who was closest to being brought back for further interviews was Wenhong Luo, an associate professor in Villanova’s business school who has lived in Upper Providence for more than six years. Six board members voted to bring Luo back, with DiBello and Mark Dehnert the only ones not including him on their lists.

“A lot of things are going online,” Luo said. “I think the way that we’re doing instruction has changed.”

He also emphasized looking into innovative initiatives that might give Spring-Ford an edge.

Luo believes Spring-Ford is “undervalued” in the region.

“We have a school district that is not very well-known in the Philadelphia area,” Luo said.

Through employing educational technology and “innovative” policies and curricula, he said the district could raise its profile.

Two others who were interviewed, Bruce Bailey and Kelly Spletzer, were named by four board members to be potentially brought back Monday.

Bailey, who had a son who graduated from Spring-Ford in 2010, praised the school board’s work and spoke of possibly expanding hybrid learning, depending on the results from Spring City Elementary.

Spletzer, a Vanguard employee who manages a team of five people, said Spring-Ford is “a good school district from a business standpoint.” The mother of five students currently in the district said she believed Spring-Ford should move on from a “stabilization” mentality of recent years to one of “progress” with the improvement of the economy.

Twin Valley teacher Peter Ruckelshaus was mentioned by three board members on their shortlists. He explained his feeling that the district must adopt more progressive policies, that his children don’t feel as much a “part of the process” in their education as they would like.

George M. Carter Jr. was mentioned as a possible bring-back by board member Clara Gudolanis. Carter, who has done audits for the IRS, formerly served as a liaison between the board and Oaks Elementary. With two daughters in the district, Carter said “discretionary income has dried up” and that the district’s budget would require some creative thinking.

Former Spring-Ford students Kathleen Byrne and Joshua Arnold were also interviewed Thursday but were not mentioned on any lists at the end of the meeting. Byrne focused on a lack of post-high school guidance she said she and her sister experienced in the district and Arnold said upcoming budgets should be carefully analyzed, but hiring teachers and expanding extra-curricular activities is important.

With so many candidates offering so many ideas, DiBello expressed his desire to continue seeing them.

“I think, one, that these people should continue to get involved in going to committee meetings,” DiBello said. “Two, I took a lot of notes. A lot of great initiatives (came up). They all had great insight or confirmed some things board members had been feeling.”